


in my life i have seen people walk into the sea, just to find memories plagued by constant misery

by errantgods



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, POV Aaron, snapshots of the twinyards through the years, who among us has not proofread something while tipsy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-01 19:58:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19184572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/errantgods/pseuds/errantgods
Summary: Aaron hates this; he’s  supposed to be the one with the shitty fucking coping mechanisms. This particular shortcoming isn’t supposed to be another thing that points towards the constant neon sign "Twins" between them.It’s almost a miracle that they met at all. There are a million scenarios where Andrew and Aaron didn’t make it even this far. And the idea that Andrew maybe doesn’t, even in some small way, want to be alive, is almost too much.





	in my life i have seen people walk into the sea, just to find memories plagued by constant misery

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. lmk if i can improve the tags!!  
> 2\. when i say canon it means what i want it to mean (by which i mean i did not research or factcheck)  
> 3\. aaron says God a lot because he's from the south not because he's christian. evidence? my own life

Aaron is wondering, intensely, pointedly, about how to make shadow puppets with his fingers. At first, he had tried to casually observe the juvenile detention center visitation room he finds himself in.

But the near-burnout of being strung out and clammy while surrounded by guards employed by the government to keep an eye on misbehaving boys was too much, so he’s looking at his hands.

The only shadow puppet he can remember is the dog. He’s pretty sure he’s doing it wrong.

Uncle Luther is a stiff, cardboard presence next to him--fascinated by the prospect of reuniting two brothers separated by the sin of the mother without giving a single solitary fuck about how either of them feel about their salvation or whatever the fuck.

Someone comes in, and Aaron finally forces himself to look up from his fidgeting hands and finds himself looking at--himself. What the fuck.

He knew, objectively, that this boy existed. This guy who has already made it clear that he wants nothing to do with Aaron. This guy who has the same birthday as him. This guy who he literally couldn’t _not_ be with for something like nine months and also this guy who he has never, ever, met before in his life.

They look exactly alike. He’s never met Andrew, but he’s _seen_ him, every time he’s seen a mirror. And yet. As much as they look exactly fucking alike, it’s more like looking at a photo negative of himself.

Andrew doesn’t move. Aaron’s fingers are slippery and won’t stop tapping against the tabletop between them, and he keeps looking at Andrew like he’s trying to find some physical difference, and also some sign of _life_ , but Andrew just stares back, like he’d rather be anywhere but here.

And then, this asshole is talking, and Aaron doesn’t even process what he said for a full fucking thirty seconds because he’s too busy thinking, absurdly, _so that’s what I would sound like if I didn’t care about anything. If I’d grown up in California_ , like those are things he’s wondered about his whole life.

Then, Luther elbows him impatiently and Aaron understands that Andrew has just made a joke about Aaron joining him in juvie. But closer to an insult. If he keeps twitching, Aaron might have to assume it was a threat.

He has no idea how drug tests work, but he’s not sure he would pass one and he’s also definitely sure that he’s too young to be failing drug tests and going to jail. Which, of course, should mean that Andrew is also too young to be in jail.

“Why the fuck are _you_ here anyway?” Uncle Luther cuffs him across the back of his neck for cursing. Aaron flinches, maybe a little more than that almost-affectionate action demands of him, but the whole _cursing is a sin_ shtick isn’t really his thing, so he also rolls his eyes. Andrew is staring at Luther.

Even Uncle Luther, the most unnerving man Aaron knows, seems unnerved by that stare. So even though Aaron knows for a fact that Uncle Luther also wants to know why the _heck_ Andrew is in juvie, the man breaks the very, very tense silence by saying, like he thinks he’s a revivalist preacher, “Boys, I’m so grateful to have been given the opportunity to bring you two together. How about I leave you to get to know each other better?”

Andrew replies, forcefully, “No need.” He’s smiling, but Aaron’s never seen this smile before, doesn’t know if he could make it himself. It looks less like an expression and more like someone’s peeled the flesh back from their--his skull. “Besides, we’re all family, right?” That, Aaron believes, definitely felt like a threat.

Aaron barely remembers the rest of the time he spends with his evil twin.

Andrew spends the whole time, probably less than ten minutes, poking and prodding at Aaron, trying to piss him off. Aaron tries to return the favor, but nothing he says seems to have any effect, which makes him angrier than anything else.

After Andrew makes one last comment about Aaron’s deadbeat mother (“ _your_ mother” like they’re not even fucking related), Aaron chokes back his retort. (“Yeah, but at least she didn’t leave _me_ in foster care. At least she came back for _me_. At least she didn’t leave the _state_ to get away from _me_.”)

Shaking, he stands up, and the movement is violent enough to draw the eye of a couple guards. One of them starts towards them, before doing a double take and processing that this particular boy is not the twin wearing an orange jumpsuit.

Because, _fuck_ , there’s two of him.

“I’m leaving,” he says, and he makes for the exit, but Andrew stops Uncle Luther from following him with a very quiet, very dangerous “Not yet,” so Aaron leaves and waits outside the visitation room.

He doesn’t know how long he stands there, wondering distractedly about how Andrew spends his time in prison and what foster care would be like and definitely, definitely, definitely not what life would have been like if his--their mom had never given either of them away.

Definitely not thinking about what it would be like if he _knew_ Andrew. Andrew’s an asshole. He’s not wondering about this shit.

When Uncle Luther comes out, he’s quiet. Aaron knows how to take a hint, so he follows him out of the building, trying to draw as little attention to himself as possible.

In their California rental car, Uncle Luther declares, grandly, in his preacher voice, “When your brother gets out, he’s going to come live with you and your mother.”

Aaron knows, for a fact, that his mother was not consulted on this decision. And that there’ll be hell to pay when she is, even if Uncle Luther wins out in the end.

Aaron is also skeptical of the idea that Andrew has been consulted in this matter. Andrew seems perfectly fine in juvie and Aaron is beginning to think this dear brother who he doesn’t know even a bit is a fucking sociopath.

So, Aaron snorts, very expressively.

Uncle Luther pins him to the passenger seat with the Eye of God, and clasps his hands piously over the steering wheel. He pauses for a moment of careful consideration--Aaron refuses to believe that Uncle Luther’s really fucking praying at 2:47 pm in the driver’s seat of a rental car in the parking lot of a juvenile detention center well over 2,400 miles from home.

“Aaron, Andrew doesn’t hate you.” Aaron resists the urge to snort again, because he’s not fucking stupid. “He just,” Uncle Luther bobs his head back and forth diplomatically, before he continues, “He just doesn’t understand brotherly love, yet.”

It’s a fair assessment. Aaron can’t really _argue_ with it, but something about the way Luther says that, the words he chose, rubs Aaron the wrong way. He pushes the thought away, buckles his seatbelt, and leans into the passenger side door, ending the conversation.

***

Andrew doesn’t talk when he comes to live with Aaron and Tilda. He moves from room to room like a massive red light, flashing _danger_ without ever saying a word.

He steals Tilda’s cigarettes. He lights them up right in front of her.

She tried to assert her authority over him exactly once. Andrew stood directly in front of her, blew smoke in her face, and said, almost like he was curious, “What do you want to do, _mom_?”

He doesn’t belong in the Minyard house. He refuses to be Tilda’s son. He makes it clear that he won’t be, without ever saying more than a couple words. It is, Aaron will admit, kind of fucking awesome.

Maybe a couple weeks after he moves in, Tilda hits Aaron in front of him. Andrew doesn’t do anything, but Tilda looks at him like she’s afraid he might. He just watches her impassively from the hallway. She declares that she’s going out for the night.

When Tilda has pulled out of the driveway and Aaron is holding a very old, unappetizing bag of frozen peas to his jaw, Andrew sits down next to him on the couch and offers him a cigarette.

When Aaron passes on this, the one thing he’s decided he doesn’t want in his life, Andrew offers him something else.

“What would you give me if I could make her stop?” he doesn’t make it sound quite like an offer, more like a thought exercise on fun things that will never happen.

Aaron laughs, looks at him, laughs again. He’s feeling particularly bitter today.  “Bullshit. What the fuck can I give you that you wouldn’t just take,” he says, pointing at the cigarette.

Andrew’s hand twitches, dropping ash on the couch between them. He waves the cigarette, gesturing vaguely as if considering that. “If I make her stop using you like a piñata,” he lets that hang, an accusation that feels more directed at him than her, before he continues, “you get your shit together. If I make her stop, then it’s just you and me. Nobody else, no girls or assholes or whatever until we part ways and you become a hotshot fucking ex-junkie doctor or whatever.”

Aaron tries to process this offer. Fails. Tries again. He lets himself imagine it: Andrew being someone who cares about Aaron enough to watch his back. Andrew being someone who cares about Aaron full-stop. He does not let himself imagine what “make her stop” entails. He can’t think of a price too high for what Andrew is offering.

“Just you and me,” he says, hesitant, like he’s warming up to it.

“Is that a yes?”

“Yes,” Aaron says, offering a handshake to seal the deal, before he realizes that he’s never had any sort of physical contact with Andrew.

Andrew takes his hand, looks him in the eye, and nods, like nothing else needs to be said. He doesn’t say anything else, just lets go and turns on the TV and invests the same level of attention that he had in their conversation.

Aaron feels sick to his stomach, like maybe Andrew is just fucking with him, but he _wants_ it to be true too much to call him out on it.

***

Months go by. Fucking _months_. Andrew joins his fucking Exy team, takes too many of his fucking classes, but he doesn’t stop Tilda. And Aaron has no fucking idea why, but that makes it so much _fucking_ worse than it ever was before he showed up.

Aaron is at some mandatory evening tutoring/suspension session in Andrew’s place, and he’s vaguely kind of pretty fucked up when he gets a call. He almost leaves the room to answer, but then he remembers that he’s supposed to be his heartless troll twin, so he looks the supervising teacher in the eye and answers right there.

Mistake.

The hospital has called to inform him that there was an accident. His mother is dead. Andrew is receiving medical attention. Their next of kin have been notified, but would he like to come be with his brother in this difficult time?

He doesn’t know what, exactly happens after that. It’s all jumbled together.

Being driven to the hospital by the supervising teacher.

A miserable fantasy of Andrew telling him that he killed her to stop her from hurting Aaron anymore.

A more miserable fantasy of Aaron having misunderstood, and it’s Andrew who’s dead and not Tilda and it’s just the two of them again but now Aaron knows that there could have been more.

A bone-chilling fear that the whole accident had nothing to do with Aaron and that Andrew never cared and never will care about anything, least of all Aaron.

He knows Andrew made this happen. No matter everything else, no matter what he can’t force himself to accept, he’s certain of this.

At the hospital, under the sympathetic and completely misguided eye of the teacher, Aaron stands near Andrew, who has one arm in a cast and a friction burn right above the collar of his long-sleeved tee, where the impact threw him against his seatbelt.

There’s a motley collection of bruises and scratches covering his arms and face. Aaron wonders how many of them were made by her.

Oh, _Jesus fucking Christ_ , she’s dead.

It’s like Andrew read his mind, and he wants to pile on the blame. He looks at Aaron shrewdly, no differently than the bored glances he’s sent Aaron’s way for months, and says, “Time to pay up.”

Aaron hates him. He’s made a deal with a monster but some stupid part of him can’t stop thinking that he’s _wrong_ about this and he’s _wrong_ about Andrew and he doesn’t know what else to do, he has nothing left, so he nods.

***

In the week between the crash and the funeral, Andrew and Aaron don’t speak. Not to each other, not to anyone. Aaron spends the whole week getting unspeakably fucked up, and Andrew treats the whole week like a test-run for never acknowledging Aaron’s existence ever again.

Aaron finally breaks his silence at the wake, standing miserably next to Andrew, when his--their cousin Nicky comes up to them. Aaron doesn’t know why the fuck Nicky is here. Nicky got out of this ridiculous goddamn family to be with his boyfriend in Germany and he came back, presumably so he, too, can hold a grudge against Aaron for something Aaron never asked for.

He says, forcefully but quietly, “He _killed_ her, Nicky.” He jabs a sullen finger at Andrew.

Andrew raises an eyebrow, not looking at him at all, and says, blandly, to Nicky who he doesn’t even know, “And _he_ is higher than a presidential Christmas tree.”

Aaron turns to look directly at Andrew, who continues to look out over the crowd, and says, very seriously, “Fuck you.”

Then, he turns and watches the crowd, hating Andrew more than anything except, apparently, the idea of listening to any of these assholes try to talk to him about things that they know nothing about.

Nicky, who has been trying to thaw the words out of them since he came back into town yesterday to adopt them or some crazy shit like that, looks dizzy with relief, and nausea, and the impossible search for a response to that kind of conversation.

***

When Nicky is settled into a new home with Andrew and Aaron, Aaron locks Andrew in the bathroom. Nicky can’t really stop it. Aaron spends God knows how long in there, delirious and sick and desperate and hating himself, and then Andrew leaves him in there for an extra day, for luck.

When he finally gets out, Nicky gives him a really long, ridiculous hug that he doesn’t think this (or any other) situation warrants, and Andrew still won’t acknowledge him. But, while Aaron was trying to knock down the bathroom door, apparently, Andrew changed his name to Minyard.

Not like Tilda Minyard. Like Aaron. Just him. Just the two of them. If it were anyone else, Aaron might think it were about family, but this is Andrew (Andrew _Minyard_ ) and Aaron’s just fucking angry because this is Andrew reminding Aaron that they made a deal that _should_ be irrelevant but somehow just _isn’t_.

***

Aaron knows, of course, that the deal he made with Andrew was a mistake. But that doesn’t stop him from re-upping to go to college with him and Nicky.

It’s a mistake, and he knows that he’ll regret it someday, but he had no fucking idea that it would come so soon at Palmetto State.

His first Friday on campus, he goes to an Alcoholics (slash Narcotics) Anonymous meeting, and within a couple minutes he decides he’s never going back. Except. There’s this girl there who smiles at him, and Aaron doesn’t think he’s a particularly pathetic guy, but he kind of wants to swoon.

As soon as the meeting is over, he’s out the door, eager to skip small talk and embarrassing conversations with cute girls he can’t talk to.

When classes start, she’s in half his classes, and she notices him in all of them, even the massive fucking lecture halls.

They join a couple study groups together, and she pushes him to talk more, talk to her all the time, and after a few weeks when she smiles at him in that way that makes his stomach twist up in knots and says, “You don’t talk much. Are you just shy or do you really have nothing _at all_ to say?” something in him snaps.

“I can’t do anything with you. Not that I don’t want to. I mean, I like you, but,” Aaron’s gonna die here. He’s insulted this cute girl who wants to talk to him and he’s made her uncomfortable at the same time and this is absolutely how he’s going to die.

He watches Katelyn parse through Aaron’s final words on this hellish earth, her face open and more than a little confused, but, at the end, she breaks into a grin. “Who says I want to do anything with you? I just want to get to know you, Aaron.”

And, yeah, Aaron’s fucked. His life is a series of grave miscalculations, but he can’t help it if he’s going to make another one. He swaps numbers with Katelyn.

***

Aaron has finally found someone he hates more than Andrew. This righteous little asshole Neil is actively trying to ruin the very delicate balance that Aaron has found in his life, and Aaron really fucking hates him.

But, on the other hand, Neil has single-handedly moved mountains by convincing Andrew to come to (early) Thanksgiving for Nicky’s sake.

Neil somehow _gets_ Andrew, and he’s so fucking smug because he can just _get_ Andrew to do what he wants.

A few hours later, Aaron feels like the world is fracturing around him. Nothing feels real. There’s blood everywhere. He doesn’t know if he’s still holding the racquet but _holy fuck_ he just _killed someone_ and he can’t stop staring at Andrew.

Andrew, by the way, won’t stop fucking _laughing_. Aaron feels like half of him is back where he first met Andrew, looking at a carbon copy of himself that he can barely recognize. Aaron can’t move. This is backwards: Aaron’s supposed to be the frantic jumpy one. When did they switch?

Everything feels like snow static, and then people are coming up the stairs and Neil is moving and _Neil_. _Neil knew something was wrong_.

Andrew is scarier than he ever was sober right now, and when he demands Aaron come over so he can--what the _fuck_ \--check to make sure that _Aaron_ is okay, Aaron almost wants to laugh because this feels like a come-to-Jesus moment because he doesn’t know _anything_ and everything he thought he knew about Andrew is, apparently, wrong, but nothing makes sense, so, why fucking not.

Andrew is throwing up and Nicky’s parents have finally pushed themselves past redemption and some part of Aaron wants to start swinging the racquet again and on top of everything, his life is a fucking _joke_ because Andrew’s worried about the blood on Aaron’s face.

***

Aaron can’t believe he killed someone. In the middle of the school year. More than that, he can’t believe that he’s in the passenger seat of Andrew’s car, Nicky in the back, driving back to Columbia from court scott-free.

Their lawyer had mentioned something about this, but Aaron wasn’t ready to hear the prosecuting attorney--not the one who had chosen to pursue charges, because that attorney had been fired for misconduct--apologize to the judge, and apologize to _him_ , and apologize to _Andrew_ for this whole ordeal.

He wasn’t ready to hear the attorney tell all of them that the district attorney’s office had reviewed the circumstances of the murder and would not be pursuing charges.

He wasn’t prepared to hear Nicky just fucking break down crying, and he might be looking for things that aren’t there but he thinks that Andrew relaxed, just a little, at that, like he was letting go of some anxiety that Aaron didn’t know had been there in the first place.

Andrew is driving _very_ fast, clearly eager to get back to Neil, and normally Aaron might hate that but he knows that Katelyn is waiting there, too, because this was their compromise, so he kind of wishes Andrew would drive a _little_ bit faster.

Two days later, Andrew and Aaron find themselves back in therapy, which also happens to be Aaron’s least favorite place in the fucking world.

He’s settling in for an hour-long round of the quiet game, but Dr. Dobson-- _please, call me Bee_ \--clearly sees weakness in the way Aaron has sat down uncomfortably but refuses to move even a centimeter and the way Andrew is cataloguing all the figurines on her shelf, so she breaks the silence almost immediately.

Small mercies: she doesn’t congratulate him for getting away with murder. Instead, she thanks them for coming this week despite the circumstances. Andrew smirks. Aaron rolls his eyes and looks out the window.

“I can imagine it would be a relief to not have to relive unpleasant experiences in front of an audience, for both of you.” Nobody moves. Aaron knows this, because he can see Andrew go _absolutely_ still out of the corner of his eye. “But,” Dobson continues, gently, “I can imagine _both of you_ have unanswered questions, and now that you’re not legally obligated to give the answers in a court of law, the only way you can get answers is if you ask.”

Silence. It’s like she thinks that just recognizing that fact is going to trigger an honest conversation between brothers, where they can clear the air and move forward.

But Aaron’s had nothing _but_ questions since he met Andrew, and he doesn’t even know how to put them into words. He keeps getting stuck on the word _why_.

Andrew, still as ever, however, asks a tiny immaculate glass frog, “Do you regret killing him?”

Aaron doesn’t know what the fuck Andrew could possibly mean by that. He’s not Neil. The only thing he can imagine that’s worse than having nightmares about killing Drake for the rest of his life is moving past it altogether. So he says, “Ideally, I absolutely would have gone my whole life without doing that.”

Andrew continues to stare at the figurines, shifts his gaze from frog to a delicate scorpion. In his periphery, Aaron sees his hand clench around the armband on the opposite arm.

Something that Katelyn told him a month or so ago comes to him: that he didn’t have a choice, because someone was _hurting_ his _brother_ , but Aaron’s half-convinced that Andrew would just laugh at him if he said that here, right now.

Instead, he says, angrier than he realized he was, “But he deserved to die.”

Dr. Dobson is watching him, not surprised or proud or worried or disappointed or anything, just a freakishly calm presence halfway between Aaron and his brother.

After a long, empty silence, Andrew turns to look directly at him. “Well?”

“Well, what?” Aaron’s not in the mood for this. Trying to figure out what Andrew expects from him when he doesn’t even know the rules to this stupid fucking game.

“Well, it’s your turn.” _Holy shit_ , Andrew really does think this is a game. They’re taking _turns_. Aaron stares at him.

Quid pro quo. You give an answer, you get an answer, and Aaron’s head is full to bursting with _why_ s that range from inane (why do you like hot chocolate so fucking much) to earth-shattering (why didn’t you tell me or Nicky). But the one that gains traction is the first thing he ever said to Andrew.

“Why were you in juvie?” And Andrew smirks like Aaron’s passed some convoluted goddamn _test_. He thinks, stupidly, briefly, that maybe this question was the key to the whole disconnect between them. Like if Andrew committed arson or something it’ll unlock the secrets of the universe.

But when Andrew answers, he doesn’t give Aaron a crime. “Drake,” he starts, very neutrally, and Aaron hasn’t ever heard the name from him, “liked the idea of twins.”

Aaron stares back at Andrew as he tries to process that. But he can’t. He feels sick.

He feels like somebody shoved him off a building or in front of a car and Andrew is implying that he has been trying to protect Aaron since before they even met. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to believe that and he doesn’t know how else he can possibly interpret that.

He swallows hard and looks away. There’s nothing to say now. He can’t imagine thanking Andrew for this, can’t imagine Andrew accepting it, so he watches his hands until the hour is up. Dobson may try to talk again, but Aaron has officially checked out of this.

He’s trying to retrace his whole life so it makes sense to have a brother who is so _ridiculously_ fucked up that he’d leave such a shitty situation only for someone he’s never met but he wouldn’t do it for himself.

And he wouldn’t ever just fucking _talk_ to that someone.

***

On a Friday night, Aaron finds himself filing out of the Foxhole Court after the game crowd has mostly dispersed, waiting for Andrew to admit that they’re going to the Vixens’ victory party. Nicky is indulgently listening to Kevin’s play-by-play breakdown, forcing him to remember the high points along with their “catastrophic shortcomings.”

Andrew and Neil are leading the way in companionable silence. Aaron didn’t know Andrew could _do_ companionable silence, but he doesn’t look like he wants to kill Neil even a little bit as he steps out of the stadium and pulls out a pack of cigarettes, flipping off Kevin preemptively.

They don’t make it far, though, before a strange woman steps out of her car, and calls “AJ,” in the group’s direction.

Andrew drops an unlit cigarette and stops walking. Neil honest to God looks like he’s reaching for a gun. Nicky makes a shocked noise behind Aaron and they all come up short, ogling at this strange woman from Andrew’s past coming up on them like she’s reuniting with a long-lost family member.

“Andrew?” Neil looks at him, as if that’s a complete fucking question.

Andrew shifts from foot to foot, eyes fixed on this woman who Aaron thinks, vaguely nauseated, must be Cass Spear, and blindly hands Neil a key to his car and says, “Bye.”

For Neil, that brutal dismissal is enough. He takes the key and starts dragging Nicky and Kevin across the parking lot. Aaron stares him down, daring him to make him leave Andrew alone in this parking lot.

Neil meets his stare for a few seconds before resuming the hard work of wrangling Nicky away from them, talking quietly about how Andrew doesn’t _want_ them there.

Nicky doesn’t give in altogether until he meets Aaron’s eye and Aaron nods to him. Some unspoken agreement passes between them to not leave Andrew to not-deal with his problems alone.

Cass has come up to them and she doesn’t even look at Aaron, just pulls Andrew into a hug, and Aaron is _revolted_.

The world is full of shit, because of all the people in the whole wide world, this woman who was, Aaron is certain, somehow complicit in Andrew’s shitty fucking childhood can tell them apart. She has no fucking right.

Aaron wants to break something, because if _Nicky_ isn’t allowed to hug Andrew after years of working to earn his trust, Cass doesn’t get to come back into Andrew’s life after all this time and hug him without earning the right.

Without Andrew stopping her, violently, from touching him ever again.

And he _isn’t_ stopping her; he’s just standing there, arms held out like he’s spilled something on his shirt, while she hugs him and rubs his back and murmurs fervently, “AJ, I’m so glad you’re okay. It’s okay, kiddo,” over and over again.

Aaron doesn’t really think, but suddenly he’s prying her hands off of Andrew, telling her to _get the fuck away from him_ . Andrew just steps back, looking very tense and nervous in a way that Aaron has never, _ever_ associated with him.

Cass’s eyes are on Aaron now, mostly because he’s blocking Andrew from her line of sight, and her eyes aren’t warm but they’re not angry, like he would expect from someone whose son he fucking killed with a massive fucking racquet.

She seems like she could be kind if circumstances were different, and Aaron, wildly, perversely, imagines another life where Drake never existed and Aaron and Andrew lived together with this maternal woman who just _hugs_ people instead of Tilda.

But Cass is here because of what Aaron has done, what her own fucking son did to Andrew, and God only knows for sure how many other kids who were in her care. He glances back at Andrew, wondering if he’s going to kill her now, or later, or if he’s mad at Aaron for breaking up their hug.

Andrew, completely transformed by this whole fucked up scenario, looks like his face is running an emotional decathlon. He opens his mouth, closes it. He watches Cass, doesn’t even seem to see Aaron between them. He looks at his armbands and starts fumbling with them.

Aaron turns back to Cass, angrier than he can ever remember being. “Why are you here?”

She smiles sadly and says, quiet, “AJ’s like family to me.”

Aaron can _feel_ his blood pressure rising. “ _Andrew_ ,” he says, voice shaking, “came here to get away from you.” He doesn’t know if that’s technically true, but the details aren’t important right now.

And then, just to make her go away and never come back, he adds, voice hoarse and strained, “Andrew chose me over you.”

She looks at him, eyes soft but distracted, and says, “I know why you did it. It’s okay, I forgive you.”

And _oh, wow_. This woman has flown across the whole goddamn country to track down a boy that she has failed _fundamentally,_  and she’s acting like _they’re_ the ones who should be seeking forgiveness.

Aaron thought he needed to be forgiven, but not like this, and not by this ridiculous, self-righteous woman who’s trying to save them from drowning even when she’s underwater herself.

Apparently, Andrew finds this pretty fucking ironic, too. From behind Aaron, he lets out a short, hateful snort of laughter and throws something at Cass’s feet. Aaron stares at the armbands in front of him, which clearly still hold the knives Andrew always carries.

What are they doing on the ground?

When he turns to look at Andrew, his brother is holding out one arm, pale and washed-out under the parking lot lights and Aaron sees _scars_ , and somehow this is worse than everything else he’s learned about Andrew, knowing that he’s not, or he wasn’t, by any stretch of the imagination, okay.

Andrew has decided what he wants to say, and he looks so fucking _angry_ and _desperate_ that Aaron can hardly identify his words as coming from him because his voice is as cold and remote as ever. “Well, Cass, are you going to forgive me, too? Maybe if I’d told you, he never would have come here. Maybe if I’d finished the job,” he shakes his arm, “your sweet little family wouldn’t have been ruined. Cass? Do you want me to be sorry for getting your son killed?”

Aaron makes some sort of choked noise that he has no control over. Cass doesn’t respond, because she’s too busy covering her mouth against increasingly violent sobs.

Andrew stares at her and says, indifferent and cold, “You don’t belong in South Carolina, Cass. Go home.” And he turns away from her, casting about for his dropped cigarette.

When Aaron turns back to find Cass crying so hard he’s surprised she can see, but she reaches out imploringly to him, like she expects him to go against Andrew’s wishes and defend her presence here, like they _need_ her here.

Aaron stoops to pick up Andrew’s armbands, steps closer to her, looks her in the eye, and tells her, “I’d do it again.” And he means it. He stares her down until she retreats to her car, still crying, and pulls out of the parking lot.

Aaron turns to watch Andrew again as he struggles to light his cigarette. That cigarette is, in this moment, his whole fucking world, so Aaron just follows him as he begins to move back towards the Foxhole Court, like it’s an anchor to South Carolina.

Aaron pockets the armbands for now. By the stadium, Andrew finally manages to light his cigarette. He puts away his lighter, takes a long drag, and then, so quickly Aaron almost misses it, he throws a punch at the concrete wall.

Aaron shoulders his way between him and the wall just as Andrew pulls his fist all the way back for a second punch. Andrew blinks, surprised and bored at once, and instead just gazes dispassionately at the fresh blood on his knuckles.

Aaron reintroduces himself to his twin for what he hopes is the last time.

He looks back, panicked and terrified, at all the times Andrew has pointedly _not_ given a fuck about his own safety: gone to juvie to keep Aaron out of danger, gotten into a deadly car accident _on purpose_ to stop Aaron from being hurt, accepted court-ordered medication as the consequence for keeping Nicky safe, placed himself between Kevin and Neil and actual honest to God organized crime families to protect them.

Actively hurt himself to not ruin someone else’s perfect fucking rotten piece of shit life.

Aaron hates this; _he’s_ supposed to be the one with the shitty fucking coping mechanisms. This particular shortcoming isn’t supposed to be another thing that points towards the constant neon sign **twins** between them.

It’s almost a miracle that they met at all. There are a million scenarios where Andrew and Aaron didn’t make it even _this_ far. And the idea that Andrew maybe doesn’t, even in some small way, want to be alive, is almost too much.

Aaron doesn’t know how he could endure the burden, which he can barely carry _now_ , of not having known his own fucking twin for his whole life, multiplied across his whole future.

He blinks, and imagines a future where Andrew didn’t make it to his junior year of college at all and Aaron is fifty and his kids ask him about an uncle they never met and he can’t tell them a goddamn thing because Aaron didn’t ever fucking _know_ him.

They’re _twenty_ now and Aaron doesn’t think he’s ever known his brother at all.

He blinks again, trying violently to shake off that nightmare _what-if_.

Andrew watches the last of this revelation play out on Aaron’s face, and when he’s bored with it, he tries to dismiss Aaron from his miserable presence. “Thought you had a party to go to.”

“Are you fucking _kidding_ me?” As if Aaron’s going to leave Andrew in an empty parking lot after what he’s just learned, what he’s just seen.

Andrew continues to watch him, daring him to leave, so Aaron pulls out his phone and dials Katelyn and puts her on speakerphone. It rings a few times before she picks up.

“Hey, babe, everything okay?” She’s cheery and the noise is muffled, like she’s stepped into the bathroom to take his call.

“Yeah, listen, I can’t make it. I’m hanging out with Andrew tonight.”

After a long pause, she ventures, “Impromptu trip to Columbia?”

“No, nothing like that,” he assures her, and when she hums her acceptance, he adds, “make-up lunch tomorrow?”

“Yeah, that should work! We miss you here!” and she hangs up.

After a carefully measured pause, Andrew officially gives up on punching the wall and leans against it next to Aaron. “Nicky’s probably gone full mother hen.”

Aaron takes that as the closest Andrew’s going to come to expressing concern, so he sends a text saying Cass is gone and not much else. He slides into a crouch against the wall, taking a deep breath. Andrew sits down next to him, smoking his cigarette.

A few minutes pass in silence and Aaron briefly considers taking up smoking just for something to do. Then Andrew’s phone buzzes. He stares at it, considering, for a moment, before he answers. He puts it on speakerphone. _Quid pro quo_.

“You have reached the Minyard twins. How may we tell you to fuck off tonight?” Andrew greets the person on the other end.

“Phones work both ways, you know.” Aaron wonders if he’ll ever not find Neil’s voice this aggravating.

Andrew exhales smoke, lets Neil’s words hang for a moment, before he says “I didn’t know Kevin taught you how to nag.”

Neil lets out a loud, obnoxious puff of air that may or may not be a laugh, and Aaron just has to fucking deal with the new, irritating dimension Neil adds to this silence. Finally, Neil says, “I’m staying on the girls’ couch tonight. I’ll see you tomorrow after my run.”

The grimace that worms its way onto Andrew’s face perfectly captures how Aaron feels. Neil wasn’t built to be considerate, and Aaron wasn’t built to want to witness such a thing, ever.

Andrew says, “Okay,” and hangs up.

Aaron picks up an anonymous looking chunk of rock and slings it across the parking lot like he’s skipping a rock over a lake. Andrew snorts, stone-faced, and follows suit, challenging Aaron to a silent competition.

It’s over an hour later, after they’ve transferred most of the rubble against the stadium wall to the far end of the parking lot, that they finally start the long walk back to the Tower.

Andrew thrusts out one hand under Aaron’s nose in a grabbing motion. “Give them back.”

Aaron rolls his eyes and shoves Andrew’s armbands at him without stopping or slowing down, daring Andrew to keep up with him. “You realize you gave Neil the keys to your apartment, right?”

He hears Andrew grumble something unintelligible and slightly threatening a couple steps behind him, so Aaron counts it as a victory.

**Author's Note:**

> people who comment on my fics....the backbone of society.....


End file.
